In addition to a public reading of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, it might also be instructive to the American people to have a public reading of the Communist Manifesto’s ten principles in order to see how closely they align with the positions of the American democrat party.

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of land to public purposes.

2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.

3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.

5. Centralization of credit in the banks of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly.

6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.

7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.

8. Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of industrial armies, especially for agriculture.

9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of all the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the populace over the country.

10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc.

Liberals do suffer from mental illness and there is even a book out on that. Ill just say in this case the illness displaying itself as premeditated ignorance and practiced irrationality.

Alexander Hamilton explained how to read the Constitution in the Federalist Papers. The essence of our Constitution embodies positively allowed actions. Intentionally, the multitude of actions not allowed by each government branch remains unexpressed. Therefore, Hamilton in Federalist Paper 78 uses the term manifest tenor meaning clearly visible direction of thought, and in Federalist Paper 81 rejects a popularly acclaimed spirit when explaining judgment. With his guidance it is not that difficult to figure out.

First off, like a lot of conservatives, you treat the Constitution as if it were something that it's not. You invoke the Constitution as a magic word -- ascribing to it mystical powers of organizational perfection, as if the Constitution, in itself, holds the power to make us all free, well-behaved, and self-sufficient.

Second, you tacitly assume that everybody basically agrees on the principles embodied in the Constitution, and on how those principles should be applied in real life.

The fact that you wrote this piece at all, should be a big clue that your assumptions are wrong.

It's not just you -- it's a failing common to a lot of conservatives, who apparently do not understand what John Adams meant when he said,

We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.

John Adams understood what today's conservatives do not: that the Constitution -- as wonderful as it is -- is nothing more than a formal statement of a pre-existing common agreement on how government and people should co-exist. It was based, further, on an assumption that people are not only "moral," but more importantly that people have a common understanding of what "moral" means.

That common understanding no longer exists (if it ever really did....). It is not possible to "return" to the good old days, unless and until some sort of common agreement can be re-established.

If you want to be effective, you need to start making the case for conservative and moral behavior. Because the alternative -- expecting people to live by principles with which they do not agree -- leads to the use of force to make them live that way.